Wednesday, September 12, 2007

College Football's Fan Nation

by nsc

I know Fresno State has a huge game coming up this weekend with a very strong Oregon team. I know many of you Bulldog fans enjoy reading the blog because of the football related content that both MDG and I provide. I know that the blog has been a great addition to my life and I have enjoyed writing it for every Bulldog (and visiting) fan out there. However, today I want to write about something that has nothing to do with the outcome of the Oregon-Fresno State football game. I would like to touch on the topic of college football and how it has become far too important in the lives of students, alumni, and even your average fan.

This past weekend in a game between Rutgers-Navy the Navy QB took a tremendous hit from the Rutgers defense. Immediately after Rutgers fans began chanting obscenities in the stands. Now many of us will just push this aside because of the fact that they are kids and that is what kids do when they are having fun. I on the other hand think that fans of this nature are becoming the norm in college football and that is something I never want to see. I understand that a big hit is big hit but there is a respect level that should be shown for those players on the football field. I believe that respect level is being ignored by so many fans today. I will be the first to admit that I am not a fan of any of the players from Boise State or Hawaii but you will not hear any obscenities from my mouth towards players from those teams if they come into Fresno and lose. You will not hear me putting down these teams if they bomb in front of the Doghouse on national television. Two years ago Fresno was able to finally defeat the Broncos after four consecutive losses and around my seats all I could hear were chants of "You Suck D**k" and "Overrated Pieces of Sh**". I don't mind the overrated chant, that has become so common that I can completely ignore it. But when fans begin using obscenities like "you f**king suck", or "you suck d**k" to the other team I think they are crossing the line.

I may be preaching to the choir when it comes to my complaints of the fans in college football but I believe many of us are forgetting what we are there to do. We are at the stadium to cheer on our team to win. I do not go to Fresno State's games to put down fans who are coming in from other states or cities. I do not go to the stadium to see which fans are going to fight. I do not go to the games to find out if our fan base is louder than the other team we are playing. I go to Fresno State football games to watch our Bulldogs fight their hardest to win. I go to these games to watch our players give their all for the pride of the valley and the university. We are watching a team full of late teens and early 20's play their hearts out. For the most part each and every one of these players leaves it all on the field and for that effort alone we should respect what they do. What we as fans have to remember is it is only a game. If the Dogs knock off Boise this year t hat is great, but we will have to turn around and play them again next season. When visiting fans come into our stadium we should welcome them as friends and enjoy the competition against one another. We will have to travel to their world next season so we can only hope that they would treat us the very same as we treat them. What I have seen in Bulldog stadium leads me to believe that opposing fans are not going to be so accepting when I make the trip to their stadiums. Where I sit in the stadium (section 27) generally has a large contingent of visiting fans and I have seen some terrible things happen in Bulldog stadium. In the end all I can hope is that the Oregon fans treat me as well as I treated the Oregon family that sat in front of me in 2006.

We are watching a game and nothing more. If you do not invest your life into college football (which most of you shouldn't) then the outcome of the game may effect for the rest of the day and even on into the following week, but remember that game is not your life. Your family and your friends are your life. Football will come and go as we are able to watch it year after year. Some years will be far better than others. Just remember that the players and visiting fans all deserve the same amount of respect as you would want them to give you. If you are the type of person that likes to be treated like shi* then so be it. I hope that others treat you the way that you treat them but I ask those in Fresno's football world to be a bit more classy when it comes to visiting fans. If they are obnoxious and such then so be it, that has nothing to do with us. We can be great fans and let our football team do all of the talking for us. Even if the football team doesn't come through this year there will be next year and you can always count on that. I want to say thank you to those who read the blog and comment on it. For me it has been a very good experience and one I would like to continue doing for the next couple of years. I hope that everyone will continue coming to the Bulldogfootballblog to read about what is going on in the Bulldog football world.

7 comments:

I remember talking to some frinds at Oregon State and hearing od how many OSU fans were spit on and young children cursed at terribly by FSU fans. It's one of the main reasons why more of the UO/FSU games are plaed at UO- out of control FSU fans.

But it's not just FSU. Clearly there are other stadiums as well. I've heard some unbeleivable things about Oklahoma fans in Norman (throwing feces at opposing fans...).

Id would be nice to be able to take kids to a college football game at some stadiums.

I think fans that go over the edge are simply losers that have little in their lives to cheer for so they take their trash talk to the games. They give the rest of us fans a bad image. I would be willing to bet that most of those "losers" never played a down of football in their entire lives and thus cannot relate and respect those players on the field that have worked so hard to play the game we all love. Trash talkers should be expelled from games and not allowed to attend any more games for the entire year to teach them the respect they were never taught at home...

As a HUGE Duck fan, I gotta say I'm ashamed of a lot of the a**holes who share my passion. It's silly, it's rude, it's dumb. But there it is.

The picture you put at the top of your post says 1000 words about what causes most of the ridiculous behavior. I even got yelled at by a fellow Duck fan a couple weeks ago who was into HER cups by 10:30 a.m. It's universal and sad.

I hope you have a great experience when you're in Eugene...95% of the Duck fans out there would have you over for dinner. Watch out for that 5% though...they're louder than sin and can spit a looooooong way.

classy post here. Good for you. I expect the jerks who ruin things for others have no memory of the games nor do they really care. Too bad there is not some way to weed them out.here's to a mighty, exciting game.

I have seen how Fresno State fans have been towards the visiting team and the visiting fans. During my undergrad years at Fresno State, I had tickets in the student section. This was during the time when alcohol was still served at the games. With all the expletives and obscenities directed toward the visitors section and being behind the visiting team it's little wonder why the student section was relocated and why alcohol was no longer served at games.

I dealt with cretins in that section who were too drunk to remember where their seat was and I had beer spilled on me a couple times too. It was not fun. I liked how everyone stood on their feet in that section for the whole game to create the sense of being involved but there were those who ruined it for everyone.

Some people I knew were shocked at the fact that we would take away a home field advantage such as that but I told them that it had to happen because of a few bad apples. I've been on the road to places such as Reno, San Jose and Seattle and must say that the fans there are not even as hostile as our fans have generally been. It's been more of a friendly banter and I'm thankful for that. We, as fans, have no reason to act primitive towards visiting fans.

good post! This sort of thing needs to be said, and often. I think some friendly competition in good humor is always fun and is what makes the game of football the best sport in the world, but there are so many who take it way too far. I was really impressed with the respect and courtesy our team and fans received from the Texans from last week's game. I think we should learn from their friendliness and hospitality.